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The Irish 
Question 

I. HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

II. LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

By the T{ight Hon. W. E. GLADSTONE, 



M.P. FOR MIDLOTHIAN. 





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THE 



IRISH QUESTION 



L-HISTORY OF AN IDEA 
H.-LESSONS OF THE ELECTION 



EIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE 

M.P. FOR. MIDLOTHIAN 



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because the harvest is come."— St. Mark iv. 29 



NEW YORK 

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1886 



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THE IRISH QUESTION. 



L— HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

In the year 1868, I was closely associated with the 
policy of disestablishing the Irish Church. It was 
then, not unfairly, attempted to assail the cause in 
the person of its advocate. To defeat this attempt, 
an act became necessary which would otherwise have 
been presumptuous and obtrusive. In order to save 
the policy from suffering, I laid a personal explana- 
tion before the world.* The same motive now obliges 
me to repeat the act, and will I hope form a sufficient 
excuse for my repeating it. 

The substance of my defence or apology will, how- 
ever, on the present occasion be altogether different. 
I had then to explain the reasons for which, and the 
mode in which, I changed the opinions and conduct, 
with respect to the Church of Ireland then estab- 
lished, which I had held half a century ago. I had 
shown my practical acceptance of the rule that change 
of opinion should if possible be accompanied with 

* ' A Chapter of Autobiography,' Murray, 1868. 



4 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

proof of independence and disinterested motive; for 
I had resigned my place in the Cabinet of Sir Robert 
Peel in order to make good my title to a new point 
of departure. On the present occasion, I have no 
such change to vindicate ; but only to point out the 
mode in which my language and conduct, governed 
by uniformity of principle, have simply followed the 
several stages, by which the great question of auton- 
omy for Ireland has been brought to a state of ripe- 
ness for practical legislation. 

It is a satisfaction to me that, in confuting imputa- 
tions upon myself, I shall not be obliged to cast im- 
putations on any individual opponent. 

The subject of a domestic Government for Ireland, 
without any distinct specification of its form, has been 
presented to us from time to time within the last fif- 
teen or sixteen years. I have at no time regarded it 
as necessarily replete with danger, or as a question 
which ought to be blocked out by the assertion of 
some high constitutional doctrine with which it could 
not be reconciled. But I have considered it to be a 
question involving such an amount and such a kind 
of change, and likely to be encountered.with so much 
of prejudice apart from reason, as to make it a duty 
to look rigidly to the conditions, upon the fulfilment 
of which alone it could warrantably be entertained., 
They were in my view as follows : — 

1. It could not be entertained, except upon a final 
surrender of the hope that Parliament could so far 
serve as a legislative instrument for Ireland, as 
to be able to establish honourable and friendly re- 



HISTORY OF AT* IDEA. 

lations between Great Britain and the people of that 
country.* 

2. Nor unless the demand for it were made in 
obedience to the unequivocal and rooted desire of 
Ireland, expressed through the constitutional medium 
of the Irish representatives. 

3. Nor unless, being thus made, it were likewise 
so defined, as to bring it within the limits of safety 
and prudence, and to obviate all danger to the unity 
and security of the Empire. 

4. Nor was it, in my view, allowable to deal with 
Ireland upon any principle, the benefit of which 
could not be allowed to Scotland in circumstances of 
equal and equally clear desire. 

5. Upon the fulfilment of these conditions, it ap- 
peared to me an evident duty to avoid, as long as 
possible, all steps which would bring this great 
settlement into the category of party measures. 

6. And, subject to the foregoing considerations, I 
deemed it to be of great moment to the public weal 
that the question should be promptly and expedi- 
tiously dealt with ; inasmuch as it must otherwise 
gravely disturb the action of our political system by 
changes of Ministry^ by Dissolutions of Parliament, 
and by impeding the business, and derogating 
further from the character^ of the House of Com- 
mons. 

These were the principles, which I deemed ap- 

* I have not in the following pages given explanations on this 
head, as I think they were sufficiently supplied by my speech on 
the introduction of the Irish Government Bill in April last. 



6 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

plicable to the subject ; and every step I have taken 
from first to last, without exception, has been 
prompted by, and is referable to, one or other of 
them. 

From the torrent of reproachful criticisms, 
brought down upon me probably by the necessity 
of the case, it is not easy to extricate, in an adequate 
form, the charge or charges intended to be made. 
One or two of the statements I must own surprise 
me ; as for example when Lord Northbrook, com- 
plaining of me for reticence before, and for my 
action after, the election of 1885, states confidently 
that nothing had happened " that could not have 
been foreseen by any man of ordinary political fore- 
sight." I do not dwell upon the undeniable truth 
that many things may be foreseen, which, notwith- 
standing, cannot properly become the subject of 
action until they have been seen as well as foreseen. 
But I broadly contest the statement. I assert that 
an incident of the most vital importance had hap- 
pened, which I did not foresee ; which was not 
foreseen, to my knowledge, by any one else, even if 
some might have hoped for it ; and which I doubt 
whether Lord Northbrook himself foresaw ; namely, 
that the Irish demand, put forth on the first night 
of the Session by Mr. Parnell, with eighty-four Irish 
Home Iiulers at his back, would be confined within 
the fair and moderate bounds of autonomy ; of an 
Irish legislature, only for affairs specifically Irish ; of 
a statutory and subordinate Parliament. But in this 
incident lay the fulfilment of one of those conditions 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 7 

which were in my view essential, and which had 
been theretofore unfulfilled. 

The more general and more plausible form of the 
attack I think may be stated as a dilemma. Either 
I had conceived the intention of Home Rule precipi- 
tately, or I had concealed it unduly. Either would, 
undoubtedly, have been a grave offence ; the second 
as a plot against my friends, the first as an attempt 
to escape from the sober judgment of the country, 
and to carry it by surprise. The first aspect of the 
case was presented by Lord Iiartington in the House 
of Commons,* and by Mr. Chamberlain, on the. 20th 
of June, at Birmingham.f The second was put for- 
ward by Mr. Bright, in addressing his constituents,^ 
and, with much point and force, by Lord Iiarting- 
ton § at Sheffield. In substance he argued thus : 
"Mr. Gladstone has never, during fifteen years, con- 
demned the principal of Home Rule. Either then, 
he had not considered it, or he had assented to it. 
But, in his position as Minister, he must have con- 
sidered it. Therefore the proper conclusion is, that 
he had assented to it. And yet, though I was Secre- 
tary for Ireland, with Lord Spencer as Viceroy, when 
he was Prime Minister, to neither of us did he con- 
vey the smallest idea of such assent." 

Telling as this statement evidently was, it abounds 
in leakages. In the first place, l deny that it is the 
duty of every Minister to make known, even to his 
colleagues, every idea winch has "formed itself in his 

* < Times,' May 11. f * Times,' July 2. 

% ' Times,' June 21. § ' Times,' June 29. 



8 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

mind. I should even say that the contradictory 
proposition would be absurd. So far as my experi- 
ence of Government has gone, subjects ripe for action 
supply a Minister with abundant material for com- 
munication with his colleagues, and to make a rule of 
mixing with them matters still contingent and remote, 
would confuse and retard business, instead of aiding 
it. But letting pass, for argument's sake, a very irra- 
tional proposition, I grapple with the dilemma, and 
say non sequitur : the consequence asserted is no 
consequence at all. It was no consequence from my 
not having condemned Home Rule, that I had either 
not considered it, or had adopted it. What is true 
is, that I had not publicly and in principle condemned 
it, and also that I had mentally considered it. But 
I had neither adopted nor rejected it ; and for the 
very simple reason, that it was not ripe either for 
adoption or rejection. It had not become the un- 
equivocal demand of Ireland : and it had not been 
so defined by its promoters, as to prove that it was a 
safe demand. It may and should be known to many 
who are or have been my colleagues, that I made 
some abortive efforts towards increasing Irish influ- 
ence over Irish affairs, beyond the mere extension of 
County Government, but not in a shape to which the 
term Home Rule could be properly applied. Nor 
have I been able to trace a single imputation upon 
me, whether of omission or commission, in respect 
of which I should not, by acting according to the 
orders of my censors, have offended against all or 
some of the rules, which I have pointed out as the 



HISTORY OF ATT IDEA. 9 

guides of my conduct, and by which I seek to stand 
or fall.* 

As these disputes of ours, trivial enough from one 
point of view, are in a certain sense making history, 
it may be well if, in connection with the thread of 
these observations, I recall, by means of a very brief 
outline, some particulars relating to the Government 
of Ireland, and to the demand for a domestic legisla- 
ture, during the last half century. For that demand, 
constant in the hearts of Irishmen, has nevertheless 
been intermittent in its manifestation ; sometimes 
wider, sometimes narrower in its form ; sometimes, 
as in the famine, put aside by imperative necessity ; 
sometimes yielding the ground to partial and lawless 
action ; sometimes exchanged for attempts at practical 
legislation, which for the moment threw it into the 
shade. 

The great controversy of Free Trade, the refor- 
mation of the Tariff, and the care of finance, pro- 
vided me, in common with many others, nay, in 
the main provided the Three Kingdoms, with a 
serious and usually an absorbing political occupation 
for a quarter of a century, from the time when the 
Government of Sir It. Peel was formed in 1841. 
When that period had passed, and when the question 
of the franchise had been dealt with, the general 

* Among other persons whose animadversions I have examined, 
I may mention those of Mr. Goschen (' Times,' May 1 and 3), 
Lord Salisbury (' Times,' June 14 and 30), Mr. Baxter (' Times,' 
May 1), Sir M. H. Beach ( k Times,' June 24), Lord R. Churchill 
('Times,' June 28), and Lord Hartington, passim. 



10 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

condition of Ireland became the mam subject of my 
anxiety. 

The question of a home-government for Ireland 
was at that time in abeyance. The grant of such a 
government to that country had only been known to 
us, in the past, either as the demand for a repeal of 
the Legislative Union, or in the still more formid- 
able shape, which it presented when the policy of 
O'Connell was superseded by the men of action, and 
when the too just discontent of Ireland assumed the 
violent and extravagant form of Fenianism. The 
movement for Repeal appeared to merge into this 
dangerous conspiracy, which it was obvious could 
only be met by measures of repression. 

In none of these controversies had I personally 
taken any direct share, beyond following the states- 
men of 1834 and of 1844 by my vote against Eepeal 
of the Union. Mournfully as I am struck, in retro- 
spect, by the almost absolute failure of Parliament, 
at and long after those periods, to perform its duties 
to Ireland, I see no reason to repent of any such 
vote. Unspeakably criminal, 1 own, were the means 
by which the Union was brought about, and utterly 
insufficient were the reasons for its adoption ; still 
it was a measure vast in itself and in its consequential 
arrangements, and it could not be made the subject 
of experiment from year to year, or from Parliament 
to Parliament. There was then a yet stronger reason 
for declining to impart a shock to the Legislative 
fabric by Repeal. Before us lay an alternative pol- 
icy, the relief of Ireland from grievance ; and this 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 11 

policy had not been tried in any manner at all ap- 
proaching to sufficiency. It was not possible, at the 
time, to prognosticate how in a short time Parlia- 
ment would stumble and almost writhe under its 
constantly accumulating burdens, or to pronounce 
that it would eventually prove incapable of meeting 
the wants of Ireland. Evidently there was a period 
when Irish patriotism, as represented b}^ O'Connell, 
looked favourably upon this alternative policy, had 
no fixed conclusion as to the absolute necessity for 
Home Government, and seemed to allow that meas- 
ures founded in "justice to Ireland" might possibly 
suffice to meet the necessity of the case. But the 
efforts made in this direction, down to the time of 
the famine, were, though honest and useful, only 
partial ; and they unhappily had been met by an ob- 
stinacy of resistance, which entailed long delays, 
and frequent mutilations ; and which in all cases de- 
prived them of their gracious aspect, and made even 
our remedial plans play the part of corroborative 
witnesses to an evil state of tilings. 

It will be admitted that the Government of 
1868-74 endeavoured on a more adequate scale, 
principally by what is still called in some quarters 
sacrilege and confiscation, to grapple with an invet- 
erate difficulty. Once more, in acknowledgment of 
these efforts, the National Party fell into line. But, 
on the important question of Education, we were de- 
feated in 1873, not by an English, but by an Irish 
resistance. Other measures, to which I had looked 
with interest, could not be brought to birth. But a 



12 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

happy effect had been produced upon Irish feeling; 
and prosperity, both agricultural and general, singu- 
larly, it might be said unduly, favoured for some 
years the operation of the Land Act of 1870. We 
had taken seriously to the removal of grievance, as 
the alternative policy to Repeal of the Union. So 
much had been achieved, with the zealous support of 
the electorate of England and Scotland, that it was 
our plain duty to carry through that policy to the 
uttermost, and to give no countenance in any shape 
to proposals for either undoing or modifying the 
present constitution of the Imperial Parliament, un- 
til it had been established to our satisfaction, or con- 
clusively shown to be the fixed and rooted conviction 
of the Irish people, that Parliament was unequal to 
the work of governing Ireland as a free people 
should be governed. 

At this time it was, that the new formula of 
Home Pule came forward as matter for discussion, 
not in Parliament, but in Ireland ; before the Irish 
public, and under the auspices of Mr. Isaac Butt, who 
was at that time simply an individual of remarkable 
ability, not yet the representative or leader of a 
Nationalist party, far less of a Nationalist majority. 
There were, at the time, no inconsiderable presump- 
tions that Parliament could meet the wants of Ire- 
land, from the conspicuous acts it had just accom- 
plished. It was very well known that in some cases 
where those wants had not been adequately met, such 
as the case of the Borough Franchise in 1868, it was 
really due to the defective expression of them by 



niSTOKY OF AN IDEA. 13 

Irish Members of Parliament. It was plain that 
there was no authoritative voice from Ireland, such 
as was absolutely required to justify a Prime Minis- 
ter of this country in using any language which could 
be quoted as an encouragement to the movement on 
behalf of a domestic Legislature. Accordingly, I 
contended at Aberdeen in the summer of 1871, that 
no case had been established to prove the incom- 
petence of Parliament, or to give authority to the 
demand of Mr. Butt. I felt, and rightly felt, the 
strongest objections to breaking up an existing con- 
stitution of the Legislature, without proof of its 
necessity, of its safety, and of the sufficiency of the 
authority by which the demand was made. But 
even at that time I did not close the door against a 
recognition of the question in a different state of 
things. I differed as widely as possible, even at that 
time, from those with whom I have been in conflict 
during the present year. For, instead of denounc- 
ing the idea of Home Pule as one in its essence 
destructive of the unity of the Empire, in the fol- 
lowing words I accepted the assurance given to the 
contrary : 

" Let me do the promoters of this movement the full- 
est justice. Always speaking under the conviction, as 
they most emphatically declare, and as I fully believe 
them, that the union of these kingdoms under Her Majesty 
is to be maintained, but that Parliament is to be broken 
»*p."* 

* « Times,' Sept. 27, 1871. 



14 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

Thus, at the very first inception of the question, I 
threw aside the main doctrine on which opposition 
to Irish autonomy is founded. This was the first 
step, and I think a considerable step, towards placing 
the controversy on its true basis. 

In the General Election of 1874, a great progress 
became visible. Mr. Butt was returned to Parlia- 
ment as the chief 'of a party, formed on behalf of 
Irish self-government. It w r as a considerable party, 
amounting, as is said, to a small nominal majority, 
yet rather conventionally agreed on a formula than 
united by any idea worked into practical form. But 
a new stage had been reached, and I thus referred 
at the opening of the Session * to the proposal of 
the Irish leader : 

" That plan is this — that exclusively Irish affairs are to 
be judged in Ireland, and that then the Irish members 
are to come to the Imperial Parliament and to judge 
as they may think fit of the general affairs of the Em- 
pire, and also of affairs exclusively English and Scotch. 
[Mr. Butt : No, no.] It is all very well for gentlemen 
to cry " No " when the blot has been hit by the honour- 
able gentleman opposite " (Mr. Newdegate). . . . 

" I cannot quit this subject without recording the 
satisfaction with which I heard one declaration made 
by the right honourable gentleman who seconded the 
amendment (Mr. Brooks). My honourable and learned 
friend said, that Ireland has entirely given up the idea 
of separation from this country." 

* ' Hansard, ' Debate on Address, March 20, 1874. 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 15 

Thus I again accepted without qualification the 
principle that Home Rule had no necessary con- 
nection with separation ; and took my objection 
simply to a proposal that Irishmen should deal ex- 
clusively with their own affairs, and also, jointly, 
with ours. 

After the death of Mr. Butt, Mr. Shaw became 
the leader of his party, and in 1884 delivered an 
exposition of his views in a spirit so frank and loyal 
to the Constitution, that I felt it my duty at once to 
meet such an utterance in a friendly manner. I 
could not indeed, consistently with the conditions 1 
have laid down, make his opinion m}^ own. But 
I extract a portion of my reference to his speech, as 
it is reported.'* 

"I must say that the spirit of thorough manliness in 
which he approaches this question, and which he unites 
with a spirit of thorough kindliness to us, and with an 
evident disposition to respect both the functions of this 
House, and the spirit of the English Constitution, does 
give hope that if the relations between England and 
Ireland are to become thoroughly satisfactory, the most 
important contribution to that' essential end will have 
been made by my hon. friend, and those who speak 
like him." 

In a speech at the Guildhall, on receiving an 
address, I reverted to the subject of Home Rule. 
This was the period (October, 1881) when I deemed 
it my duty more than once to denounce in strong 

* ' Hansard,' Feb. 27, 1880, vol. ccl. p. 1587. 



16 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

terms the movement against rent in Ireland, and 
with it the extravagant claims which seemed to me 
to be made in the name of National Independence. 
Yet I then spoke as follows : 

"It is not on any point connected with the exercise 
of local government in Ireland ; it is not even on any 
point connected with what is popularly known in that 
country as Home Rule, and which may be understood 
in any one of a hundred senses, some of them perfectly 
acceptable, and even desirable, others of them mischiev- 
ous and revolutionary — it is not upon any of those 
points that we are at present at issue. With regard to 
local government in Ireland, after what I have said of 
local government in general, and its immeasurable 
benefits .... you will not be surprised if I say 
that I for one will hail with satisfaction and delight any 
measure of local government for Ireland, or for any 
portion of the country, provided only that it conform 
to this one condition, that it shall not break down or 
impair the supremacy of the Imperial Parliament."* 

Once more I entered on the subject, in the House 
of Commons, on February 9, 1882. I referred to 
the party, led then as now, by Mr. Parnell. The 
citation is from Hansard : 

"Neither they, nor so far as I know Mr. Butt 
before them, nor so far as I know Mr. O'Con- 
nell before him, ever distinctly explained, in an 
intelligible and practicable form, the manner in 

* 'Times,' Oct. 14, 1881. 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 17 

which the real knot of this question was to be untied. 
The principle upon which the hon. members propose 
to proceed is this — that purely Irish matters should be 
dealt with by a purely Irish authority, and that purely 
Imperial matters should be dealt with by an Imperial 
Chamber in which Ireland is to be represented. But 
they have not told us by what authority it is to be de- 
termined what matters, when taken one by one, are 
Irish, and what matters are Imperial. Until, Sir, they 
lay before this House a plan in which they go to the 
very bottom of that subject, and give us to understand 
in what manner that division of jurisdiction is to be 
accomplished, the practical consideration of this sub- 
ject cannot really be arrived at, and, for my own part, 
I know not how any effective judgment upon it can be 
pronounced. Whatever may be the outcome of the 
hon. member's proposal, of this I am well convinced, 
that neither this House of Commons, nor any other 
that may succeed it, will at any time assent to any 
measure by which the one paramount Central Authority, 
necessary for holding together in perfect union and 
compactness this great Empire, can possibly be either 
in the greatest or the slightest degree impaired. We 
are not to depart from that principle ; and what I put 
to the hon. gentleman who has just sat down, and to 
the hon. member who preceded him is this — that their 
first duty to us and their first duty to themselves, their 
first obligation in the prosecution of the purpose which 
they have in view — namely, the purpose of securing the 
management of purely Irish affairs by Irish hands — is 
to point out to us by what authority, and by what in- 
strument, affairs purely Irish are to be divided and dis- 
tinguished, in order that they may be appropriately and 



18 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

separately dealt with from those Imperial affairs and 
interests which they have frankly admitted must remain 
in the hands of the Imperial Parliament. 

Mr. Pinnkett hereupon stated that he had taken 
down my words, and that he could only understand 
them as an invitation to Irish members to re-open 
the question of Home Rule. Nor did he see how I 
could after using such words resist a motion for a 
Committee on the subject.* To any and every plan 
for referring such a subject to a Committee of Parlia- 
ment I have at all times been opposed. But Mr. 
Plunkett's meaning was evident, nor could I dispute 
the substance of his interpretation. 

I will not weary my reader by adding to citations 
by which his patience has already been so severely 
tried. But I ask him to remember that down to 
this time no safe-guarding definition of Home Rule 
had been supplied, and no demand, in the constitu- 
tional sense, had been made by the Irish nation. I 
beg him then, after he has read the foregoing dec- 
larations, to place himself for a single moment in 
my position, as one who thought conditions to be 
indispensable, but also thought that the question 
might under conditions be entertained, and then to 
ask himself whether it was possible more carefully 

* The ' Times ' of January 8, 1882, states that in my speech, 
as Prime Minister, I "diverged, amid general amazement," into 
the question of a separate Legislature, and supporting Mr. Plun- 
kett, said that the language which I used was " susceptible of an 
interpretation which, we fear, may do infinite and irreparable 
mischief. " 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 19 

to indicate in outline the limits within which the 
subject of Irish self-government might, and beyond 
which it might not, legitimately be considered, and 
whether it is anything less than absurd to impute to 
me * that my " principles " forbade me to promote it ? 
I next pass to the period preceding the election of 
1885. It had now become morally certain that 
Ireland would, through a vast majority of her repre- 
sentatives, present a demand in the National sense. 
But no light had been thrown, to my knowledge, 
upon the question what that demand would be. 
Further, not only was there a Tory Government in 
office, but one which owed much to Mr. Parnell, and 
which was supposed to have given him, through its 
Lord Lieutenant or otherwise, assurances respecting 
Irish Government, which he had deemed more or less 
satisfactory. Under these circumstances, I conceived 
that my duty was clear, and that it was summed up 
in certain particulars. They were these. To do 
nothing to hinder the prosecution of the question by 
the Tory Government if it should continue in office 
(of course without prejudice to my making all the 
efforts in my power to procure a Liberal majority). 
Entirely to avoid any language which would place 
the question in the category of party measures. But 
to use my best efforts to impress the public mind, 
and especially the Liberal mind, with the supreme 
importance, and the probable urgency, of the question. 
And lastly, to lay down the principle on which it 
should be dealt with. These rules of action applied 

* Sir M. Beach at Bristol ('Times,' June 24, 1885). 



20 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

to the circumstances of the hour those governing 
principles which 1 have above enumerated. I pro- 
ceeded on them as follows : 

It was impossible for me, while ignorant of the 
nature and limits of the Irish demand, to give an 
opinion upon it ; and even had it been possible, it 
would have been in conflict with the condition which 
I have numbered (p. 5) as the fifth. But, to give 
emphasis to the importance of the question, I severed 
it in my Address from the general subject of Local 
Government for the three kingdoms. Ireland had 
arrived, I said, at an important epoch in her history; * 
she had claims to a special interpretation of the prin- 
ciples of Local Government.! It would be the solu- 
tion of a problem, testing the political genius of these 
nations.;): Woe be to the man who should prevent or 
retard the consummation^ It would probably throw 
into the shade all the important measures, which in 
my Address I had set out as ripe for action. || And 
the subject is one " which goes down to the very 
roots and foundations of our whole civil and political 
constitution. "^ And yet it has been said, strangely 
enough, that I gave no indication to my friends, 
except of Local Government in the sense of County 
Government for Ireland.** 

* Address of Sept. 17, 1885, p. 20. 

t Ibid. 21. % Ibid. § Ibid. p. 22. 

|| First Midlotbian Speech, Nov. 9, 1885, Speeches, p. 44. 
1 Ibid. 

*'* Iu the speech just quoted, I also said that for a Government 

•in a minority to deal with the Irish question would not be safe. 

Certainly such an operation could not but be attended with 



HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 21 

Lastly I laid down, over and over again, the prin- 
ciple on which we ought to proceed. It was to give 
to Ireland everything which was compatible with 
" the Supremacy of the Crown, the Unity of the 
Empire, and all the authority of Parliament neces- 
sary for the conservation of that Unity." * 

It appears to me that the whole of the provisions 
of the Irish Government Bill, lately buried, but per- 
haps not altogether dead, lies well within these lines, 
and that my case thus far is complete. 

What I have in these pages urged has been a de- 
fence against a charge of reticence. On the charge 
of precipitancy I need not bestow many words. 
What antagonists call precipitancy, I call prompti- 
tude. Had Mr. Pitt in 1801 carried Roman Catholic 
Emancipation, as we suppose he wished, many an 
Englishman would have thought him precipitate. 
Precipitancy indeed was avoided, but at what cost ? 
For' ni ne-and- twenty years the question was trifled 
with on one side the Channel, and left festering on 
the other, and emancipation was at last accepted as 
an alternative to civil war. Such is not the manner 
in which I desire to see the business of the Empire 
carried on. It w T as not pondering the case ; it was 
paltering with the public interests. I do not deny 
that promptitude is disagreeable in politics, as it 

danger; but that I thought it might nevertheless be properly 
undertaken is demonstrated by the tender of my support in it to 
Lord Salisbury, conveyed after the Election through Mr. Bal- 
four, although the Ministerial party scarcely reached 250. 
* Address, p. 21. 



22 HISTORY OF AN IDEA. 

often is to a doctor's or a surgeon's patient. But if 
the practitioner sees that, bj every day's delay, the 
malady takes hold and the chances of health or life 
are dwindling away, it is his duty to press the opera- 
tion or the drug, and the sufferer will in due time be 
grateful to him for the courage and fidelity, which at 
first he mistakenly condemned. 

I have endeavoured to point out the conditions, 
under which alone the question of a statutory Par- 
liament for Ireland could be warrantably entertained. 
The real test may be stated in one word : the ripe- 
ness or unripeness of the question. All men do not 
perceive, all men do not appreciate, ripeness, with 
the same degree of readiness or aptitude ; and the 
slow must ever suffer inconvenience in the race of 
life. But, when the subject once was ripe, the time 
for action had come. Just as if it had been a corn- 
field, we were not to wait till it was over-ripe. The 
healing of inveterate sores would only become more 
difficult, the growth of budding hopes more liable 
to be checked and paralysed by the frosts of politics. 
For England, in her soft arm-chair, a leisurely, very 
leisurely consideration, with adjournments inter- 
posed, as it had been usual, so also would have been 
comfortable. But for Ireland, in her leaky cabin, it 
was of consequence to stop out the weather. To 
miss the opportunity would have been not less 
clearly wrong, than to refuse waiting until it came. 
The first political juncture which made action per- 
missible, also made it obligatory. 

So much, then, for precipitancy. 



II.— LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

I.- Lessons of the Election as they regard the 
Liberal Party. 

ThC satisfactory adjustment of the Irish question 
will now, I apprehend, be the supreme object of 
every member of the Liberal party who has em- 
braced its prevailing sentiment at the present crisis. 
I shall, therefore, principally seek to draw attention 
to the bearings of the late Election on that question. 

But I will first endeavour to dispose of an impor- 
tant, though secondary point. Every Liberal politi- 
cian will feel a reasonable anxiety to estimate aright 
both the immediate effects of the Election upon his 
party, and the lessons which it teaches as to the real 
strength and eventual prospects of that party ; inas- 
much as it, and no other, has been, during the last 
half century, the principal feeder of the political 
thought of the nation, and the main organ of its 
activity. In the remarks which follow, I intend no 
sort of reproach. 

It has this year, unhappily, been divided through- 
out Great Britain into a main body, and a seceding 
or dissentient wing, of which the energy has of 
necessity been developed in directly opposing the 
candidates who belonged to the main body of the 



24 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

party, on the ground of the paramount importance 
attaching to the Irish question. The result has of 
course, for the party, been disastrous, as a very large 
share of its energies have been spent in a suicidal 
conflict. Out of 292 contests in Great Britain, no 
less than 114 have been fought between candidates 
professedly Liberal. Every one of these was for a 
seat which was essentially Liberal. The result, 
therefore, does not exhibit nominally a deduction 
from the total roll of the part} 7 . But there have 
been, also, contests between Liberals, or Dissentient 
Liberals, and Tories. Where Tory and Dissentient 
have fought, the Dissentient has probably suffered 
from inability to marshal the full Liberal force. In 
the far more numerous cases, where Tory and Liberal 
have fought, the Liberal has commonly suffered from 
the defection of all the Dissentients ; most of these 
abstaining from the poll, but some, in conformity 
with the advice of Lord Harrington , and, I ihink of 
Mr. Chamberlain, actually transferring their votes to 
the Tory candidate. 

The Liberal party as a whole has been, since the 
Reform Act, the stronger of the two parties in the 
constituencies. The measure of its preponderance 
has sensibly increased with the extension of the fran- 
chise. From 1834 to 1868, the Tory party was rarely 
under, and frequently over, 300 strong. In 1841, 
it gained a majority of eighty in straight fighting. 
Since the establishment of household suffrage in the 
towns, it has never had a majority ; except in 1874, 
when the Home Rule party, finally breaking away 



I. THE LIBERAL PARTY. 25 

from the Liberals with whom they most commonly 
had counted, took definite form as a separate sec- 
tion of the House of Commons. The majority of 
Tories, over Liberals alone, then amounted to fifty- 
nine ; and it was known to be due partly to class 
interests, cultivated of late years so assiduously by 
the Tories, but mainly to discontent, and conse- 
quent slackness and abstention, in the Liberal ranks. 
In 1868, 1880, and 1885, the Tory strength never 
approached three hundred, but fell much below its 
old standard. The Liberal majorities over the 
Tories, in these Parliaments, averaged nearly one 
hundred. On the whole it might probably be a 
fair .though a rough statement of the comparative 
strength of the two parties in the country, if we 
were to set down the Liberals as represented, on 
the average, by four-sevenths, and the Tories by 
three-sevenths, of the electoral body. 

What, then, was the loss of Liberal strength at 
the late election in consequence of the schism ? 
The test previously supplied by voting in the Llouse 
of Commons is definite so far as it goes. Two 
hundred and twenty-eight Liberals voted for the 
Irish Government Bill, and ninety-three against it. 
This test exhibits the strength of the schism as 
greatly exceeding one-fourth of the whole. It very 
slightly exceeds two-sevenths, at which I take it for 
present purposes. 

It is distributed, however, with very great in- 
equality among classes. It has hitherto commanded, 
I fear, not less than five-sixths of the Liberal Peers. 



26 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

If we go to the Liberal working men, I do not be- 
lieve it has touched a fraction higher than one-twen- 
tieth. But I now refer to independent working men. 
If we take the portion of the Liberal party, through- 
out the country, composed of those who may be 
termed employers, or who are socially in a position 
to draw with them the votes of others, it w r ould, I 
fear, be a moderate computation or conjecture that, 
of this important and leading section of Liberals, 
four-fifths at least were numbered among the Dissen- 
tients ; and these drew with them large numbers of 
dependent, though, I doubt not, as a rule perfectly 
willing voters. 

Again, the strength of the schism was unequally 
distributed, as is that of the party, in constituencies 
as well as in classes. In very many constituencies 
Liberal and Tory strength are nearly balanced. In 
these a deduction of one-fifth, or one-tenth, or even 
less, from the normal strength, transfers the seat as 
matter of course. It is impossible to estimate with 
precision the loss of Liberal strength through the 
schism ; but it must have been greater than either of 
these fractions would represent. In this ruinous state 
of facts, the results have been as follows. The party 
as a whole has been reduced from 333 in the last 
Parliament to 269, or by less than one-fifth. The 
Liberals of the main body have been reduced from 
about 235 to 196, or about one-sixth. The small- 
ness of the aggregate poll as compared with 1885, 
even on the Conservative side, is worthy of notice, 
and appears to show that a fraction of the electors, 



I. TITE LIBERAL PARTY. 27 

not inconsiderable, still holds its judgment in sus- 
pense. 

Again, the total poll in Great Britain was — 

For Liberals . . . 1,344,000 

For Dissentient Liberals . 379,000 

For Tories . . . 1,041,000 

For Tories and Dissentients . 1,420,000 

Thus the Liberals of the main body came within 

70,000, or only four per cent, of the united strength 

of the Tories and the schism. Considering that the 

aggregate party had suffered a loss which cannot be 

taken at less than twenty or thirty per cent., this is 

a remarkable result. 

Nor is there any obvious levity or presumption in 
saying that, to all appearance, at the first moment 
when Liberalism is again united, it must again be- 
come predominant in Parliament. But our antici- 
pations of its real strength in the future grow more 
and more confident when we consider how much it 
is that Toryism, under circumstances of unprece- 
dented advantage, has been able to achieve. It now 
reckons 316 members of Parliament. That is to 
say, as against the rest of the House, it is in a mi- 
nority of thirty-eight ; and it is less by nineteen than 
the Liberal numbers returned to the last Parliament. 
It has failed to win from our shattered and disunited 
party the same moderate amount of success which 
we obtained against it in November last, when it 
had the important accidental advantage of the Irish 
vote. If, with that advantage, it hardly touched 
the number of 250, and if it cannot obtain a major- 



28 LESSORS OF THE ELECTION". 

ity of the House when Liberalism is divided against 
itself in a manner unknown for nearly a centmy, 
the inevitable inference, not demonstrable but very 
highly probable, seems to be that Toryism can never 
by its own resources win, under the existing laws, a 
majority of the House of Commons, unless and until 
the tendencies and temper of the British nation 
shall have undergone some novel and considerable 
change. 

II.— The Lessons of the Election as they 
regard Ireland. 

There is nothing in the recent defeat to abate the 
hopes or to modify the anticipations of those who 
desire to meet the wants and wishes of Ireland. 

Let us look first at the result of the Election as it 
is exhibited in the total return of members to the 
House of Commons. 

The Liberal and the Irish supporters of the policy 
of the late Government, taken together, amount to 
280. The opponents of that policy are 390, show- 
ing a majority of 110 — a large number without 
doubt. It has been bravely stated by the Prime 
Minister that this is an irrevocable verdict. It is 
certainly a verdict without any instant appeal. But 
the authority which gives such verdicts has power to 
revoke them 2 and is in the practice of revoking 
them ; and, moreover, has seen and may see them 
disobeyed by the representatives whom it has em- 
powered not merely or mainly to repeat a formula, 



II. FOR IRELAND. 29 

but to deliberate upon and to follow the exigencies 
of public affairs. 

In order to estimate truly the value of such ma- 
jorities, let us refer to recent history ; bearing in 
mind especially, that the Session of 1886 was the 
first and only Session, in which the adoption of the 
policy was clearly and unequivocally demanded by 
the Irish nation, and the first and only Session, also, 
in which it had the support of a British party, or 
a British ministry. 

In 1841, the Election turned mainly on the Corn 
Law. The proposal to repeal it had been, since the 
Reform Act of 1832, frequently, and of late almost 
annually, debated ; and the country had had unusual 
opportunities of mastering the question, through the 
energetic action of the Anti-Corn-Law League. 
Nevertheless, the people returned in 1841 a Parlia- 
ment which by a majority of ninety-one placed the 
Conservative party in office to uphold the Corn Law. 
And, considering that many Whigs, who would not 
join in ejecting the Whig Government were friendly 
to the Corn Law, we may state without apprehension 
that the majority returned to support that law in 
1841 was even larger than that now returned, in 
1886, to oppose the Irish policy of the late Gov- 
ernment. 

Yet this very Parliament of 1841, by a majority 
of 98, repealed the Corn Law in 1846. 

There are many elements, beside that of number, 
which go to determine the prospects of an opinion or 
a policy. A policy which is affirmative, which is defi- 



30 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

nite, which is complete, which rallies its adherents 
on one and the same ground, has standing advantages 
over a combination which agrees only in negations, 
whose ideas advance to-day and recede to-morrow, 
which proposes no definite settlement, and waits 
upon the chapter of accidents. Especially is it a 
mighty advantage to have a nation at our back ; for 
a nation never dies. In this case we have more even 
than a nation. Few indeed, so far as I know, of our 
opponents are bold enough to deny that we have 
with us, in a degree hard to match, the general 
opinion of the widely extended British race ; not to 
say of the civilised world beyond the confines of 
England, isolated on this occasion alike from her 
sisters and her children, from her rivals and her 
allies. 

At the outset of the American Civil War, the 
friends to the Abolition of Slavery were not even a 
party ; there were no more than a section or a group. 
But, because they saw that time and events must 
needs work with them, they were content to bide 
their time. It came, and came speedily. In two 
years, the irrevocable word of freedom was spoken 
from the lips of authority. We may well be content 
to bide our time ; for we see that time and events 
are working, and must work, on our side. 

Nor is this the only solace. What may be termed 
the pot-valiant language, to which hot and passionate 
tempers have been occasionally treated, is now heard 
no more. No longer is the idea of holding Ireland 
by attachment, instead of holding it by force, illus- 



II. FOR IRELAND. 31 

trated by the supposed parallel of an attempt to 
govern by attachment, -instead of police, the criminal 
population of London. No more is the proposal of 
self-government for Ireland compared with a pro- 
posal of self-government for Hottentots. No more 
is heard the loud demand for measures of repression, 
which produced the policy named by the present 
Leader of the House of Commons the policy of the 
26th of January. Yet- the agrarian crimes reported 
by the Constabulary were (inclusive of threatening 
letters) in the 62 days of December and January, 
185 ; in the 61 days of June and July, 19-1 ; and, 
while in two years preceding there was but one 
agBtrian murder, in the twelve latest months there 
have been ten. 

What is weightier still, no more do we hear of 
the famous twenty years, during which Parliament 
was to grant special powers for firm government in 
Ireland, and at the end of which, in a larger or a less 
degree, coercive laws might be repealed, and meas- 
ures of local self-government entertained.* 

It is, then, evident, even amidst the shouts of vic- 
tory, that the Tory adversaries of Ireland have had 
a severe, perhaps an irreparable, loss : they have lost 
the courage of their opinions. On the other hand, 
the Dissentient Liberals generally, and their leader, 
seem now to be pledged to immediate and large con- 
cession ; many of them on such a scale, that they 

* It might be invidious to supply references to verify these 
statements; and it is unnecessary, as they are all both recent, and 
familiar. 



32 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

give to their idea the name of Home Rule, declaring 
themselves favourable to its- principle, and only op- 
posed to the awkward and perverse manner in which 
it was handled by the late Administration. So that, 
while a large majority of the present House was 
elected to oppose the measures of the bygone Minis- 
try, a much less large, but still a decided majority, 
has bound itself not less strongly to liberal measures 
of self-government for Ireland. The seceding Liber- 
als, added to the main body of the party and to the 
Nationalists, make a total of not less than 354. Even 
of the Ministerialists, some have declared themselves 
favourable to large concession. These professions of 
individuals might be drowned in the strong stream 
of party feeling. Without reckoning, then, on any 
sort of Tory help, we seem to have in this anti- 
Home-Rule Parliament a real majority ready to act 
in the direction at least of Irish wishes, and to run 
the risk of seeing the grant of a portion used as a 
leverage to obtain the residue. 

So that, look at the question which way we will, 
the cause of Irish self-government lives and moves, 
and can hardly fail to receive more life, and more 
propulsion, from the hands of those who have been 
its successful opponents in one of its particular forms. 
It will arise, as a wounded warrior sometimes arises 
on the field of battle, and stabs to the heart some 
soldier of the victorious army, who has been exulting 
over him. 

So much for the case of Ireland within the walls : 
it is full of hope and comfort. When we go beyond 



II. FOR IRELAND. 33 

the walls, and consider either the points of vantage 
gained, or the general progress which has been ac- 
complished, it is yet more, and by far more, favour- 
able. 

Let us now take some account of the results of the 
Elections, as they are exhibited, not in a gross total, 
but in different quarters of the country. 

The fact that Wales has been from the first under 
an incorporating union, has blinded us to the fact 
that there are, within the United Kingdom, no less 
than four nationalities. Of these four nationalities, 
three have spoken for Irish autonomy in a tone yet 
more decided than the tone in which the fourth has 
forblSden it. Scotland has approved our Irish policy 
by three to two, Ireland herself by four and a half 
to one, and gallant Wales by five to one. In the 
aggregate they have returned more than 150 sup- 
porters of the policy, and rather above fifty against 
it ; or three to one in its favour. 

In England, I might dwell on some remarkable 
exceptions to the prevailing opinion, such as those 
of Yorkshire and Northumberland ; portions of the 
country commonly supposed to be above, and not be- 
low, the average in intelligence and force of charac- 
ter. But for the present purpose we must deal with 
England as a whole, and we find that she has decided 
against Ireland by returning 336 opponents of our 
Irish policy, against 129 who support it. 

This is not, then, a partnership of three kingdoms, 
or of four nationalities, upon equal terms. The vast 
preponderance in strength of one among them en- 



34 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION". 

ables her to overbear the other three, and to reverse 
their combined judgment. The case may be even 
carried a little further. The minority adverse to 
Ireland in Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, taken to- 
gether, is twenty-five per cent, of the whole. The 
minority favourable to Ireland in the English return, 
though a small minority, reaches twenty-eight per 
cent, of the whole. So, then, England speaking by 
much less than three-fourths of her whole number 
of members, can give, against Scotland, Ireland, and 
Wales, speaking conjointly by three-fourths of their 
members, an absolute majority on the aggregate re- 
turn of no less than 110. Let us illustrate the state 
of facts by a supposed case. Whenever the people 
of England think one way in the proportion of two 
to one, they can outvote in Parliament the united 
force of Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, although they 
should think the other way in the proportion of five 
to one. And if England thinks one way in the pro- 
portion of three to one, she can outvote Scotland, 
Ireland, and Wales together, although they were 
each and all to return the whole of their members to 
vote against her. There are, therefore, reasons of 
a very intelligible kind why England should at the 
first blush take a favourable view of the advantages 
of incorporating unions. 

But the question of majority and minority does 
not rule the whole case. Ireland, with the minority 
of 280 in her favour, and carving out of that aggre- 
gate minority larg? mti jorities in three out of the four 
nationalities, stands far better than she would stand 



II. FOR IRELAND. 35 

were that minority proportion ably diffused in four, 
or even in three of them : were our opponents able 
to say that England, Scotland, and Wales were all 
against her.* 

The recent contest has been fought upon the 
question of nationality : upon the title of Ireland to 
some recognition (in Lord Carnarvon's phrase) of 
her national aspirations. Now, in the first place, 
this very fact, that an election has been contested on 
grounds of nationality, of itself gives a new place to 
nationality as an element of our political thought. 
Secondly, these nationalities will be inclined to help 
one*another. Ireland has received signal assistance 
from Scotland and from Wales on the great and 

* The figures stand thus : 

England has members .... 465 
Scotland ... 72 ) 
Ireland ... 103 I ... 205 
Wales ... 30 ) 

Case 1.— | of 465 = 310 
£ of 205 = 34 

344 
But & of 465 = 155 
f of 205 = 171 

326 

Majority . 18 

Case 2. 465 - 116 = 349 
The rest of the House 321 

Majority . 28 



36 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

capital subject of lier nationality. Should there be, 
and will there not be? — questions coming forward, 
in which Scotland or Wales have a special national 
interest or feeling, it is probable that Ireland, so long 
at least as she continues to have a voice through her 
members in British affairs, will reciprocate the boon. 
What is not less likely, and even more important, 
is that the sense of nationality, both in Scotland and 
in Wales, set astir by this controversy, may take 
a wider range than heretofore. Wales, and even 
Scotland, may ask herself, whether the present system 
of intrusting all their affairs to the handling of a 
body, English in such overwhelming proportion as 
the present Parliament is, and must probably always 
be, is an adjustment which does the fullest justice to 
what is separate and specific in their several popula- 
tions. Scotland, which for a century and a quarter 
after her Union was refused all taste of a real repre- 
sentative system, may begin to ask herself whether, 
if at the first she felt something of an unreasoning 
antipathy, she may not latterly have drifted into a 
superstitious worship, or at least an irreflective acqui- 
escence. Of two things I feel assured. First, what- 
ever practical claims either of these countries may 
make on their own behalf will be entertained and 
disposed of without stirring up the cruel animosities, 
the unworthy appeals to selfishness, the systematic 
misrepresentations, which have told so fearfully 
against Ireland. And, secondly, that the desire for 
Federation, floating in the minds of many, has had 
an unexpected ally in the Irish policy of 188^ , and 



IT. FOR IRELAND. 37 

that, if the thing, which that term implies, contains 
within itself possibilities of practical good, the chance 
of bringing such possibilities to bear fruit has thus 
been unexpectedly and largely improved. 

Let it not, however, be supposed for a moment that 
England is to be regarded as hostile to the claims of 
Ireland. What we have before us is not really a 
refusal ; it is only a slower acknowledgment. What- 
ever efforts may have been made by individuals to 
bring the national mind at the Election of 1885 to a 
perception of what was coming, it must be remem- 
bereTl that a powerful party had at that time, on 
account of the Irish vote, the very strongest reasons 
for keeping the Irish question out of view, and that 
they set up other cries, such as the " Church in 
danger," which were known and familiar, and which 
drew away attention from what was real to what was 
imaginary. So it is no great wonder or offence if, 
when the subject was novel, and when the most pow- 
erful and best organized classes in the country were 
resolutely bent on arguments which darkened all 
its bearings, it should have remained a little obscure. 
But mark the progress that has been made. A sub- 
ject which, twelve months ago, was almost as foreign 
to the British mind as the differential calculus, has 
been inscribed among the chief lessons of all Liberal 
teaching in every town and county of the land, and 
is everywhere supported by a large body of persons 
with a warmth and earnestness equal to any that is 
felt for any of the dearest and most familiar aims of 
public policy. All the currents of the political at- 



38 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

mosphere as between the two islands have been 
cleansed and sweetened ; for Ireland now knows, 
what she has never, even under her defeat, known 
before, that a deep rift of division runs all through 
the English nation in her favor ; that there is not 
throughout the land a district, a parish, or a village 
where there are not hearts beating in unison with her 
heart, and minds earnestly bent on the acknowledg- 
ment and permanent establishment of her claims to 
national existence. 

She know T s also that many, if not most, of her 
adversaries have paid the highest compliment to her 
claim for the adoption of the measure of 1886, in 
adopting, it is to be presumed as a political necessity, 
the method of systematically misstating it. Because 
they conceive it to tend to separation, they describe 
it as being in itself Separation. Because they think 
it would bring about a Kepeal of the Union, they 
describe it as being a Repeal of the Union. That 
is, by reason of what they think (most erroneously) 
that it would produce, they habitually describe * it 

* Still worse is the endeavour to tempt the voter through his 
selfishness. From an illustrated placard, printed by Bale, Great 
Titchfield Street, I cite the following words. After describing 
the majority of the Irish nation as rebels, it proceeds to say that, 
as the result of Home Rule, ' ' The labour market of England 
would be flooded with Irishmen, wages lowered." In the ' Times ' 
of July 22, a defeated Dissentient complained that hardly a 
single word on his side had reached the agricultural labourers. 
The secretary of the Liberal Association replied by showing that, 
on behalf of this very Dissentient, the labourers were informed 
by placards on every wall that, if they voted for his opponent, 
" swarms of poor Irishmen would come over and lower wages, 



II. FOR IRELAND. 39 

as being that which they know it not to he. It is 
just as in an arithmetical sum; the misstatement of 
the terms of the problem, of course, if not detected, 
makes the problem hopeless. It is without example, 
so far as I know, in the political controversies of the 
last half century. It establishes a precedent which 
may, with some kind of excuse, be used hereafter 
against its authors. It is a practice analogous to 
hitting foul in pugilism, or using weapons in war, 
which are prohibited by the laws of war. It con- 
stitutes a proof of the weakness in argument of a 
cause, driven to supply by prohibited means its pov- 
erty in legitimate resource. 

Apart from this grave aspect of the case, is there 
not something beyond the ordinary licence of con- 
troversy in charging upon the Irish people the idea 
and intention of Separation, in connection with the 
present subject ? 

As the adversary believes the measure involves by 
way of consequence the separation of the countries, 
he is entirely justified in pressing his argument ; but 
he should surely press it in the right way. 

There are two methods of conducting the argu- 

besides which 100 millions were to be spent on buying out Irish 
landlords, which would enormously increase taxes on your tea, 
coffee, cocoa, &c." We should all husband as much as possible 
in this controversy our small stock of Christian charity. But 
could the person, who wrote that the concession of the demand 
of the Irish people would drive away the Irish people from Ire- 
land, himself have believed what he wrote ? That it would 
raise wages in England, by largely drawing back the Irish, may 
not be very probable, but is certainly a less absurb proposition. 



40 LESSON'S OF THE ELECTION. 

ment, either of which it has been open to him to 
follow, and which I will call respectively the humane 
and the savage method. 

The Irish nation, while it is recovering from its 
very natural estrangement, and learning with a good 
heart the accents of loyalty, disclaims in the most 
emphatic and binding way, by the mouth of its 
authorised representatives, the idea of separation. 
The opponent of Home Rule might say, "I take 
you at your w r ord ; I am convinced you do not mean 
Separation ; but I will show you that, by certain 
consequence, this mischievous Bill involves it." 
That I call the humane method of argument. 

But the method generally adopted has been to 
say, " You disclaim Separation ; but I do not be- 
lieve you ; and so I call you, and all who aid and 
abet you, Separators." Is it too much to call this 
the savage method ? 

At least it may be held that, when we begin by 
giving the lie, there ought to be in the essence of 
the thing that we impute something of a nature to 
render our imputation probable. Is this the case 
with Separation ? What is there in Separation, that 
would tend to make it advantageous to Ireland ? 

As an island with many hundreds of miles of 
coast, with a weak marine, and a people far more 
military than nautical in its habits, of small popula- 
tion, and limited in her present resources ; why 
should she expose herself to the risks of invasion, 
and to the certainty of enormous cost in the creation 
and maintenance of a navy for defence, rather than 



II. FOR IRELAND. 41 

remain under the shield of the greatest maritime 
Power in the world, bound by every consideration 
of honour and of interest to guard her % Why 
should she be supposed desirous to forego the advan- 
tage of an absolute community of trade with the 
greatest among all commercial countries, to become 
an alien to the market which consumes (say) nine- 
tenths of her produce, and instead of using the broad 
and universal paths of enterprise now open to her 
to carve out for herself new and narrow ways as a 
third-rate State ? Why, when her children have 
now, man by man, the free run of the vast British 
Empire, upon terms of absolute equality with every 
native of Great Britain, should she be deemed so 
blind as to intend cutting them away from the great- 
est of all the marts in the world for human enter- 
prise, energy, and talent, and to doom them to be 
strangers among nearly three hundred million men, 
with whom they have now a common citizenship? 
Why is she to be insensible to all the indications nat- 
ure herself has given of the destiny of Ireland to be 
our partner in weal and woe, and why should she be 
ready to enter upon a desperate contest of strength 
with a people of six times her number, of twelve 
times her wealth, inferior to her in no single element 
of courage or tenacity ? This people, to whom even 
justice itself has never yet enabled her to offer an ef- 
fective military resistance, are now to be frightened 
out of their propriety lest Ireland should offer them 
violence, to tear herself away, unattracted to any 
foreign centre (for there is none), unwarmed by 



42 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

sympathy beyond her shores (for she would have 
none), unblessed by Heaven, and quarrelling suici- 
dally with all that could minister to her material oi- 
lier political welfare ! No ; the truth is, and history 
proves it, England has been strong enough to 
be, even through a course of generations, unjust 
to Ireland ; and now it is not want of strength 
that will put a stop to such injustice, but her 
better will, her better knowledge, the action of 
the nation substituted for the action of the few, and 
an improved and improving moral sense in public 
affairs. What reason here indicates, history proves ; 
for never did Separation become a substantive 
idea in Ireland, until the one unhappy period when 
the warlike instincts of France coincided with that 
infatuation of the British Government which in 
Ireland raised tyranny and sanguinary oppression, 
as well as the basest corruption, to their climax. 
Only superlative iniquity led Ireland even for a 
moment to dream of separating. Even then, the 
remedy would have been worse than the disease. 
None but the few fanatics of crime dream now of 
such a thing ; and they, who impute it to the Irish 
nation, treat it as a nation made up of men who are 
at once and equally traitors, knaves, and fools. 

III. — Purchase and Sale of Land in Ireland. 

I do not propose to examine in detail the causes of 
the signal defeat, which the Irish policy of the late 
Government has now received at the polls of Eng- 



III. PURCHASE AND SALE OF LAND. 43 

land, or rather of the middle and southern parts of 
England. But, in my opinion, the chief among 
those causes is not to he found in chimerical fears of 
Separation, or in aversion to the grant of self-govern- 
ment to Ireland as a whole, or even in want of time 
to understand the principles and bearings of our 
measures. The most powerful agent in bringing 
about this result was, in my judgment, aversion to 
the Bill for the Purchase and Sale of Land in Ire- 
land. 

This aversion grew out of misapprehension, which 
was itself founded on (what I think) misrepresenta- 
tions, such as the complexity of the subject made 
it impossible to remove. But, however illegitimate 
may have been the means employed, the result is not 
to be denied, and has to be taken into practical ac- 
count. The gigantic bribe which was detected in an 
offer to pay to Irish landowners what Parliament 
might deem to be the fair market value of their 
rented lands ; the attempt to combine a large equity 
with policy in an employment of British credit war- 
ranted by such high calls, and in its pecuniary results 
absolutely safe ; the daring attempt we made to carry 
to the very uttermost our service to the men whom 
we knew to be as a class the bitterest and most im- 
placable of our political adversaries, by declaring our 
two Bills to be, in our own minds, and for the exist- 
ing juncture, inseparable: all these have been swept 
ruthlessly off the field of present action by the na- 
tional verdict. Not merely the verdict expressed by 
the English majority ; for the sentiment is shared by 



44 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION". 

many of the staunch supporters of Irish autonomy, 
and has not been hitherto repudiated by the Na- 
tionalists of Ireland, who had given a somewhat 
reluctant assent to proposals entailing so heavy a lia- 
bility on the whole public resources of their country. 

The two Bills, for the government of Ireland and 
for the Purchase and Sale of land, have been used at 
the Election to destroy one another. The Land Bill 
had many friends, chiefly among Tories and Dis- 
sentient Liberals. But their love of the Land Bill 
was not so strong as their aversion to Home Bule, 
and they allowed it to lie pierced with a thousand 
gashes, in order that through it the sister measure 
of Home Rule might be wounded. On the other 
hand, the mass of the Liberals throughout the coun- 
try were fully prepared for the grant of Irish auton- 
omy, but were in many cases adverse to the ill- 
understood measure for the Purchase and Sale of 
land, which they were taught to believe could, 
under no circumstances, be severed from it. Hence 
many a seat was given to the Tories by Liberal 
abstentions, and not a few to Liberal Dissentients, 
by those who acquiesced in the destruction of the 
one Bill for the sake of securing the destruction of 
the other. So, then, this Siamese twinship of the 
Bills, put to scorn by those for whose benefit it was 
in great part designed, has been deadly to both, 
and has proved the most powerful cause of the defeat 
of the Liberal party at the elections in England. 

I think it my duty explicitly to acknowledge that 
the sentence which has gone forth for the severance 



III. PURCHASE AND SALE OF LAND. 45 

of the two measures is irresistible, and that the twin- 
ship, which has been for the time disastrous to the 
hopes of Ireland, exists no longer. 

At the same time, the partnership between enemies 
of Home Rule and enemies of the Land Bill, which 
has brought about this result, will now, we may hope, 
be dissolved. The enemies of Home Rule have ever 
been the keenest promoters of Land Purchase in the 
interest of the Irish landlords. The enemies of the 
Land Purchase Bill, instead of standing at ease, will 
now have to use all their vigilance for the purpose 
of preventing the adoption of schemes of Land Pur- 
chase founded on principles very different from, 
and, indeed, opposite to, those of the Bill lately con- 
signed to the limbo of abortions. 

We have lying before us a new point of departure ; 
but, for the sake of the subject, it may be right to 
offer a slight explanation on the Bill. 

A main object of that Bill was to get rid of the bad 
and dangerous schemes, which alone had seemed 
possible in the present centralized condition of our 
arrangements for the government of Ireland. Among 
the principles of the plan, any or all of which I 
reserve my title to uphold and urge at the proper 
time on their merits, and not as inseparable portions 
of a wider scheme, were these : — 

1. — To eechew entirely the establishment of the 
relation of debtor and creditor between the Imperial 
Treasury and the Irish occupier individually. 

2. — To deal only with an authority empowered 
under the highest sanction to bind Ireland as a whole. 



46 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

3. — To accept as security nothing less than what 
would suffice to place the fifty millions of Consols 
issuable under the Act on a footing of perfect equal- 
ity in the market with the mass of Consols already 
there. 

4. — In fulfilment of this view, to place the charge, 
not on the rents proceeding from the land alone, 
but also on the entire public revenues of Ireland. 

5. — To direct the collection and course of these 
revenues in such a channel, as to make their receipt 
and application not less safe and certain than the re- 
ceipt and application of the revenues of Great Britain. 

I trust that every British Liberal, consentient or 
dissentient, who may think that there are reasons 
sufficient to warrant some intervention of Imperial 
credit in order to solve the question of Irish land, 
will steadily resist any attempt to fasten on us a 
scheme of inferior security ; and especially will set 
his face against the establishment of direct relations 
between the Treasury and the individual occupant of 
the soil in Ireland, by reason, not only of pecuniary 
risk, but also, and far more, of very grave political 
danger. 

The subject may be summed up in three short 
queries. 

First, is it right that England, both on grounds of 
policy, and as having been art and part in the wrongs 
done to Ireland by her land laws and by many of 
her landlords, should bear her share in providing 
further facilities for the sale and purchase of land in 
Ireland % 



IV. IS HOME RULE CONSERVATIVE? 47 

Secondly, ought this provision to be made by a 
liberal use, under the peculiar circumstances of the 
case, of the public credit of the country? 

Thirdly, is it wise or justifiable, instead of dealing 
with some public authority in Ireland, to place the 
Treasury of this country in the direct relation of 
creditor to scores, or it may be hundreds, of thou- 
sands of the persons occupying land in Ireland ? 

To the first two questions I give my answer in the 
affirmative ; to the third I say emphatically, No, 

IV. — The Conservative Character of Home Rule 
for Ireland. 

I deviate for a moment from my survey of the 
political battlefield, to touch on a question more 
likely to receive consideration now than during the 
heat of the fight. 

For my own part, in arguing for the Irish policy 
of the late Administration, I have not found it my 
duty to attempt any narrow appropriation of that 
policy to the Liberal party. It was indeed eminently 
agreeable to the principles of that party, because it 
proceeded upon a rational but a broad and generous 
trust in the people of Ireland ; upon a large recogni- 
tion of that people's right to liberty, which, says 
Mr. Burke,* is " the birthright of our species," and 
which " we cannot forfeit, except by what forfeits 
our title to the privileges of our kind. I mean the 
abuse or oblivion of our rational faculties," which 

* Correspondence iii., 105. 



48 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

" destroys our social nature, and transforms us into 
something little better than the description of wild 
beasts." 

But unless the policy, from its harmonising with 
the love of liberty, and its spirit of reliance on a 
people, be, in the eyes of all but Liberal politicians, 
guilty of the unpardonable sin, and thus excluded 
from a hearing, surely it has high titles to a conser- 
vative character, and may reasonably lay claim to 
Conservative favour. For it is especially founded 
on regard for history and tradition. It aims in the 
main at restoring, not at altering, the Empire. In 
this vast mass are straightway discovered a multitude 
of subaltern integers ; municipalities, counties, colo- 
nies, and nations. Does a true conservative policy 
recommend that the dividing lines, which hedge about 
these secondary organisations, should be eyed with 
an eager jealousy, and effaced upon any favourable 
occasion ? I put aside for the moment all regard to 
the pollution and the tyranny by which an occasion 
for the Union was forced into existence ; and I raise 
the issue on a broader ground. It is surely most de- 
sirable that every subaltern structure in an enormous 
political fabric, having joints and fastenings, tie- 
beams and rafters of its own, should contribute, by 
the knotted strength thus inhering in each part, to 
increase the aggregate of cohesive force, which guar- 
antees the permanence and solidity of the whole. 

Intermediate authority, set between the central 
power and the subject, is a contrivance favourable to 
both. It softens the whole character of government 



IV. IS HOME RULE CONSERVATIVE ? 49 

as a coercive system. It saves the centre from 
strain ; and saves it also from excess. It gives a do- 
mestic aspect to commands which, when proceeding 
from a remoter source, want their best passport to 
acceptance. The ruler's will is more largely obeyed ; 
and the quality of the obedience is improved as the 
quantity is enlarged, for it becomes a willing obedi- 
ence. There are functions of government which re- 
quire from their own nature a central impulsion. 
But, wherever the nature of the thing to be done does 
not suffer, the more locally it is determined the 
better. 

And in all cases where, population not being ho- 
mogeneous, the different portions of a country (such 
as the United Kingdom) are variously coloured, as 
by race, or religion, or history, or emplojanents, the 
argument against centralisation acquires new force, 
in proportion as the central agent loses the power of 
sympathy and close adaptation to peculiar wants and 
wishes, and may lose also, where relations have not 
been altogether kindly, even the consciousness of this 
ingenital defect. When matters have reached such 
a stage, the ruler resents that resentment in the mind 
of the subject, which his own incapacity has raised. 
This comparative coldness, sometimes passing into 
aversion, discontent, and even disloyalty, we find in 
the case of Ireland, and of Ireland alone among all 
the portions of the Empire. All the rest are held 
together by freewill ; she alone is under the bond of 
force. In opposition to it, she has maintained from 
first to last the best protest in her power, and has 



50 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

availed herself progressively more and more of the 
increased means of protest with which, in singular 
blindness to the state either of her mind or our own, 
or possibly both, we have incongruously supplied her. 
And when, more positively urging her demand, she 
at the same time narrows the demand itself, so as to 
meet imperial jealousies and scruples, she is rewarded 
for her moderation by the loud assertion that the 
Irish nation speaks, it is true, but speaks with a lie 
in its mouth. 

So, then, we may fairly say of the policy which 
aims at giving Ireland an Irish Government, not 
only it is a policy broad, open, trustful, popular, and 
therefore liberal ; but also it is a policy which, instead 
of innovating, restores ; which builds upon the 
ancient foundations of Irish history and tradition ; 
which, by making power local, makes it congenial, 
where hitherto it has been unfamiliar, almost alien ; 
and strong, where hitherto it has been weak. Let 
us extricate the question from the low mist of the 
hour, let us raise the banner clear of the smoke of 
battle, and we shall see that such a policy is eminently 
a Conservative policy. 

V. — To which Party is the Work Reserved ? 

It is one of the best characteristics of the Liberal 
party, that it has never foregone an opportunity of 
closing with a good measure, come it from whom it 
might. 

It was in an endeavour to apply this principle, 



V. WHO WILL DO IT % 51 

that in December last 1 promised my best support 
to Lord Salisbury, if his Government would intro- 
duce a comprehensive measure for the settlement of 
the Irish question. This was an offer made under 
highly favourable circumstances. For, as between 
the two great parties in the State, the question of 
Irish self-government, in its principal aspects, was 
then open ground. The Liberal party of 1800 had 
the honour of resisting the Incorporating Union. 
But for the last sixty years, on the question of re- 
pealing that measure, as the proposal was entertained 
by neither party, no distinctive character had at- 
tached to the action of the one or the other. Un- 
happily, the last Tory Government, notwithstanding 
the encouragement given by the opinion of their 
Viceroy, was not prepared to move. Accordingly, 
the question of self-government for Ireland in Irish 
affairs has now taken its place in politics with the 
Liberal coat of arms stamped upon it, and has be- 
come a Liberal measure. But there remains an im- 
portant question behind. Will it, or will it not, like 
other Liberal measures, owe its coming place on the 
Statute Book immediately, if not causally, to the 
action of official Tories, sustained and made effective 
by Liberal patriotism and Liberal votes % 

There are at least four great cases, which have 
been placed on record within my memory, and in 
every one of which a Conservative Government, 
after having resisted a great proposal up to the 
moment immediately preceding the surrender, then 
became its official sponsor, and carried it into law. 



52 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

They are the cases of the Test Act in 1828, of the 
Roman Catholic Relief in 1829, of Corn Law Repeal 
in 1846 (when, however, Sir Robert Peel had done 
all in his power to throw the conduct of the question 
into Liberal hands), and of Extension of the Fran- 
chise in 1867. In the last of these cases, not only 
had the measure been resisted, but a Liberal Govern- 
ment had been overthrown in the preceding year on 
account of a measure less extended, not indeed than 
the very meagre original proposal of 1867, but than 
the measure which, by the strength of Liberal votes, 
and with the sanction of the Derbj^-Disraeli Govern- 
ment, was eventually carried. It seems extremely 
doubtful whether any one of these measures would 
have been adopted through both Houses, except un- 
der the peculiar conditions which secured for them 
on each occasion, both the aid of the Liberal vote in 
the House of Commons, and the authority of the 
Tory Government in the House of Lords. One other 
case stands alone. The Tory chiefs of 1832, with the 
exception of Sir Robert Peel, fiercely resisting the 
Reform Bill of Lord Grey, and stopping its progress 
in their own familiar fortress, the House of Lords, 
declared themselves nevertheless willing to take 
charge of the question. But public indignation was 
too strong to permit the progress of the experiment. 
A main reason, which governed me in the offer of 
last December, was my full conviction that if the 
Tory Government had acted as many were then in- 
clined to hope, the proposal would have an impartial 
hearing from the Liberal party, and an amount of 



VI. CONCLUSION. 53 

support far more than sufficient, as in 1829 and 1846, 
to make up for Orange and Tory defections, so as to 
secure the speediest and easiest, which would in my 
judgment have been also the most satisfactory, ac- 
complishment of the great design. 

With regard to that design, I do not venture to 
forecast the future, beyond the expression of an un- 
doubting belief that a measure of self-government 
for Ireland, not less extensive than the proposal of 
1886, will be carried. Whether the path will be 
circuitous ; whether the journey will be divided into 
stages, and how many these will be ; or how much 
jolting will attend the passage ; it is not for me to 
say. Nor is it for me to conjecture whether in this, 
as in so many other cases, the enemies of the meas- 
ure are the persons designed finally to guide its tri- 
umphal procession to the Capitol. But I hope that, 
should this contingence once more arise, every Lib- 
eral politician, irrespective of any misgivings (should 
he be tempted to entertain them), as to the motives 
of the men, will remember that his inexorable duty 
is to extract the maximum of public profit from 
their acts. 

VI. — Conclusion. 

If I am not egregiously wrong in all that has been 
said, Ireland has now lying before her a broad and 
even way, in which to walk to the consummation of 
her wishes. Before her eyes is opened that same path 
of constitutional and peaceful action, of steady, free, 
and full discussion, which has led England and Scot- 



54 LESSONS OF THE ELECTION. 

land to the achievement of all their pacific triumphs. 
Like the walls of Jericho, falling, not in blood and 
conflagration, but at the trumpets' peal, so, under the 
action of purely moral forces, have an hundred for- 
tresses of prejudice, privilege, and shallow prescrip- 
tion, successively given way. It is the potent spell 
of legality, which has done all this, or enabled it to 
be done. The evil spirit of illegality and violence 
has thus far had no part or lot in the political action 
of Ireland, since, through the Franchise Act of 1885, 
she came into that inheritance of adequate represen- 
tation, from which she had before been barred. Ire- 
land, in her present action, is not to be held respon- 
sible for those agrarian offences, which are in truth 
the indication and symptom of her disease ; from 
which her public opinion has, through the recent 
beneficial action, become greatly more estranged ; 
and to which she herself ardently intreats us to apply 
the only effectual remedy, by such a reconciliation 
between the people and the law, as is the necessary 
condition of civilised life. The moderation of the 
Irish demands, as they were presented and under- 
stood in the Session of 1886, has been brightly re- 
flected in the calm, conflicting, and constitutional 
attitude of the nation. I make no specific reference 
to the means that have been used in one deplorable 
case, under guilty recommendations from above, with 
a view to disturbing this attitude, and arresting the 
progress of the movement ; for I believe that the 
employment of such means, and the issuing of such 
recommendations, will eventually aid the cause they 



VI. CONCLUSION. 55 

were designed to injure. It is true that, in the close 
of the last century, the obstinate refusal of just de- 
mands, and the deliberate and dreadful acts of Ire- 
land's enemies, drove her people widely into disaffec- 
tion, and partially into the ways of actual violence. 
But she was then down-trodden and gagged. She 
has now a full constitutional equipment of all the 
means necessary for raising and determining the 
issues of moral force. She has also the strongest 
sympathies within, as well as beyond, these shores 
to cheer, moderate, and guide her. The position is 
for her a novel one, and in its novelty lies its only 
risk. But she is quick and ready of perception : she 
has the rapid comprehensive glance, which the Gen- 
erals she has found for us have shown on many a 
field of battle. The qualities she has so eminently 
exhibited this year have already earned for her a 
rich reward in confidence and goodwill. There is no 
more to ask of her. She has only to persevere. 
August 19, 1886. 



POSTSCRIPT. 



Since these pages were written the principal in- 
tentions of the ministers in respect to Ireland have 
been announced. The statesmen who in January 
deemed coercive measures an absolute necessity do 
not now propose them, although agrarian crime has 
rather increased and Ireland has been perturbed (so 
they said) by the proposal of home rule. This is a 
heavy blow to coercion and a marked sign of prog- 
ress. I am concerned to say that on no other head 
do the announcements supply any causes for con- 
gratulation : 

1. Large Irish subjects, ripe for treatment, are to 
be referred to commissions of inquiry. This is a 
policy (while social order is in question) of almost 
indefinite delay. 

2. Moreover, while a commission is to inquire 
whether the rates of judicial rents are or are not 
such as can be paid, the aid of the law for levying 
the present rents in November has been specially 
and emphatically promised. This is a marked dis- 
couragement to remissions of rent .and a powerful 
stimulus to evictions. 



POSTSCRIPT. 57 

3. A project lias been sketched of imposing upon 
the State the payment of all moneys required to 
meet the difference between these actual rents and 
what the land can fairly bear. This project is in 
principle radically bad, and it would be an act of 
rapine on the treasury of the country. 

4. Whereas the greatest evil of Ireland is that its 
magisterial and administrative systems are felt to be 
other than Irish, no proposal is made for the recon- 
struction of what is known as the Dublin Castle 
government. 

5. It is proposed to spend large sums of public 
money on public works of all kinds for the material 
development of Ireland under English authority and 
Dublin Castle administration. This plan is (1) in 
the highest degree wasteful ; (2) it is unjust to the 
British taxpayer ; and (3) it is an obvious attempt to 
divert the Irish nation by pecuniary inducement 
from its honorable aim of national self-government, 
and will as such be resented. 

6. The limitation of local government in Ireland 
to what may at this moment be desired for Great 
Britain is just to none of our nationalities, rests upon 
no recognized principle, and is especially an unjust 
limitation of the Irish national desire. In my opin- 
ion such a policy for dealing with the Irish question 
ought not to be and cannot be adopted. 

August 22, 1886. 



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